Paige tells all

In a recent interview for Lillian Garcia’s Chasing Glory podcast, Paige opened up about some of the controversies that have transpired in her personal life over the past year. Below are some highlights:

On the leaked footage of her: “I’m not a bad person. I don’t want to be known as someone like that, that’s not me. People make mistakes. I’ve made a ton of mistakes, and that was one of them. I was young, I was dumb, and I was 19 [or] 20 years old. I was dumb. And those are the kinds of things I want to tell girls. Social media is a big thing these days, [and] cameras are a big thing. Just be careful what you do with it because you never know what you’re going to be doing in your future. And I was already in this position where I knew I could have made something of myself but I still made a stupid mistake. And now that’s something I have to live with every time I walk down the street. People can see every part of me and that makes me sad. I make jokes about it all the time because it helps me heal, but when [I] hear someone degrade me I feel like I don’t deserve that because that wasn’t my fault. When that came out, I barricaded myself in the house for a couple of months. I was so sad, to the point that I was contemplating suicide. I was so sad. And that’s why I was doing so much stupid stuff. I was drinking heavily. I wasn’t doing drugs at that point, [although] I had done drugs before. I was in a really bad place…”

“I just hate the fact that I’m going to be known for that. Literally in every article it’s not just ‘Paige, WWE wrestler who was WWE Divas Champion, did this, Total Divas that.’ It’s the WWE sex tape scandal stuff. And it’s always headlined like that. And I don’t want to be remembered like that. It breaks my heart, and I was literally on the floor, I was so low. I got so skinny. I ended up collapsing with exhaustion in a hospital in England. They told me at the time it was sort of like stress induced anorexia. But my family was there and Alberto at the time was there too. I collapsed. I wasn’t eating [or] sleeping. I lost all my hair. I have clip ins right now, but I literally had no hair because my hair fell out because I was so stressed. I was so sick. And no one knows about that. I haven’t told a soul or anyone that I was in the hospital but I was there. It just broke my heart. Like why would someone want to do that to someone? And that’s again with the trust issues, I can’t trust a lot of people. Why would you put stuff out there of someone like that? Why would you want to invade someone’s privacy, like what does it give you?”

“Luckily I’ve never done anything after that because I got smart to it. But that was before the video tapes even came out. Just don’t record stuff. You don’t have to make someone happy by doing that kind of stuff. And that’s exactly what I thought I was doing, I [thought] I was trying to make someone happy…I felt like I was definitely degrading myself. [Xavier] Woods is a really nice guy. He’s actually my friend, great guy, so I also feel bad for him. I was just degrading myself as a woman, and I would never want another woman to do what I did. It’s an experience that I personally learned from, especially now. Don’t do that for someone you think that you like or you think that you love when in reality you don’t. You’re just clouded by what you think is love. I would just tell everyone, men and women, you do not want that stuff out there about you, you do not. Because everyone’s seen what you have had for breakfast pretty much. You have to think about your families. My nieces and nephews have to see it. When I was with my ex his kids had to go to school, and his kids were getting crap from it. And I have to live with that. My family is very supportive, but still. My nieces and nephews have to deal with them saying ‘Oh your aunt is a porn star’ and stuff like that. And that’s not me. That’s not me at all. I’m far from it. I’m not that person.”

On her failed drug test: “I was very embarrassed. Because the first one wasn’t actually from drugs, [it was from] not doing it in the allotted time. Which is kind of my bad, but it was a very confusing situation. I don’t know what happened there. The physical drug test passed, but the second one that was me being stupid.”

“At that time I was very embarrassed. And I was like ‘Okay I have to try and cover this up somehow.’ And I lied to my family about it too. I told them it was this and it wasn’t. And I tried to make myself not look terrible. Because I built myself on being this role model that [says] be yourself [and] you can do whatever you want. Not this person that’s running around doing drugs and partying all the time. I never wanted to be that person at all. So I was just so humiliated because it was everywhere. And obviously WWE had to cover themselves because I said something that was completely inappropriate. But I was like ‘Huh what do I do?’ I was never mad at WWE for doing that. It was kind of the kick up butt that I needed.”

On her first match back against Sasha Banks: “I was so scared. I was petrified. I had anxiety all day and I was just like ‘oh my god’ and I was running around…backstage. I couldn’t get my crap together. I just felt like I couldn’t get it together. Luckily all my friends came which was really nice. I had all my friends there. They were the biggest supporters. Probably the loudest ones in the arena they were nuts. They helped me kind of be okay. And then Sasha too. Me and Sasha aren’t close at all. We’re not close. But she’s so professional at what she does. And she’s good at what she does and I respect that. I have a lot of respect for Sasha. And she helped me through that match. Like if it were someone else I feel like it [wouldn’t have been] the way it was. But she definitely helped me through the match and I will always thank her for that. I will give credit where it is due [because] she is a fantastic wrestler. And not once did she put me in a position where I could get hurt or where she pushed me too hard. She always thought about stuff before in the match. That’s why I seem kind of [clustered] in the beginning because we were trying to adjust and get back together. We were trying to get that vibe back. But she’s such an easy person to work with. So that’s something I will always remember and I’ll always thank her for.”

“It was fantastic. I just loved the finish of it, like her getting me in her finisher, the crowd going crazy [and] getting the people involved. And then boom me hitting her with the RamPaige and everyone was like ‘ahhh!’ It was great. It felt good. And then I had a lot of relief after that because I was like ‘Okay I got the match done out of the way, I feel good.’ I had another segment later on, so I was just like ‘Thank god I don’t have to wrestle anymore I am broken.’ But it felt really good. And I’ll always thank Hunter and Vince obviously for giving me the opportunity to do that. And giving me the time to do it too. Like they gave me enough time to do whatever I wanted and even handed us more time if we needed it. It was just fantastic and it feels really good.”

On her relationship with Alberto at this point: “At this point, we were out in the public eye so much that a lot of the time I don’t want to talk about it. But what I will say about Alberto is obviously we had our ups and downs like a normal couple will. We had really bad times, really good times and it’s just one of those things. I don’t hate him in any way, shape or form. And he doesn’t hate me in any way, shape or form.”

“I’m glad that we can be adults about this. We always thought that the people were going to break us. But that’s not the case. It’s just like, ‘Okay we’ve come to this end of the road right now. Like I have to go do this and you have to go do that. Let’s just leave it like that. You go be with your family. I need to go fix my life. I need to fix myself.’ And that’s exactly what I did. And we were coming up to times where it was like ‘Lets let people know.’ And I was so burned out about the media knowing everything about me, I was like ‘Please don’t say anything about me right now. Please just don’t. I don’t want even the slightest thing about our relationship on there anymore. I just don’t want people to know my business.'”

“We ended fine and we’re fine now. It is what it is. I leave him alone completely now. We hardly speak to each other. It’s better off that way. [But] I want him to be happy [and] I want him to be even more successful because his kids are beautiful and he has a fantastic family. So I want him to be successful and I want him to be happy. Maybe he’ll find a woman that is not so on the internet. Maybe he can find a nice low key lady. I just want him to be happy. Like you go do you and I’ll go do me. But I’ll never hate him.”

In this interview, Paige also discusses her beginnings in the wrestling business, her family, Sonya Deville and Mandy Rose, and much more.